Setting of The Lost Boy

I'm reading the book called The Lost Boy written by Dave Pelzer. The book story is based on a true story of a child never get his family's love during his childhood.  The names of some main characters was changed to protect their privacy.  The main characters I've read so far are David Pelzer - the boy was abused by his mom, Roerva Pelzer, Ms. Gold, aunt Mary and Mrs. Cantaze.  At the beginning of the book, David described himself sitting on top of his hands at the bottom of the stairs in the garage where is normally lived. It was Winter 1970 in Daly City, California.  I've never slept in a garage and don't know how hard it is to be sleeping in such a place like it.  Pretty much at the beginning of the book, the author tells us about the setting of the setting of it.  David is hungry and shivering at the moment the author starts describing David's situation.  He says that David's Prisoner of the Mother.  By saying that, I can really tell how his situation is.  He wakes up from sleeping on an old army cot and immediately performs the morning chores. He's really miserable.  The cover of the book says that David is a child called It. So there is one more thing I could guess is that he's not receiving love. The author capitalizes the words: Mother, House. The House is also put in the apostrophe.  When the words are written unusually in a sentence.  Then we could know that there's something wrong with the things the author is talking about. By capitalizing these words, and  by describing the situation of David at the very beginning of the book, I somehow got the idea that David is in not a very good family.